Beyond School

Beyond;  To the degree that is past the understanding, reach or scope of. Outside the limits or reach.

School; The process of being educated

To be able to teach my children is an honor I don’t hold lightly. Those of us who homeschool should always remember how fortunate we are. The fact that we get to stay home with our kids, while being able to monitor what they learn so that it lines up with our family values is a priceless place to be.

The traditional school system has their days down to a science. Sure some teachers are better than others, some public school curriculum is better than others, but all in all, they have dialed into the 7 (or however many) periods in a day, lunch in the middle, get out by mid afternoon, do homework for 1+ hours and do it all again, 5x a week. That is a model that works. It works for some children more than others, but it is what schools have chosen to do to keep organization.

When a child is brought home from a traditional school setting to be homeschooled, the natural thing to do is model their homeschool to mimic the school they just came from. All subjects done in a day. A set time for each subject. No deviating. If schoolwork isn’t done, it can last well into the evening.

I’m here to encourage you if you have brought the traditional school system into your home and if it isn’t working for you. I’m here to encourage you because that system belongs in the schools, not in our homes. Even as I write this I realize I’m getting a bit controversial and I may make some homeschoolers mad. So if you *like* the traditional method of school and it is absolutely working for your children, meaning, more days than not you find joy in the every day and your children are thriving and having a blast…then awesome. Take my words as a grain of salt 🙂

So, I went off on a tangent there…so I’ll get back on track….

When I first heard of “unschooling” I literally thought it was that you didn’t school your children. That’s not the case. There are many different opinions on what unschooling is, but my favorite is that you take a child who was not thriving in a traditional school setting and you “undo” all the rigidness that came with their every day. Some moms even put the workbooks away completely, finding many other ways to teach the same subjects just without monotonous text books.

We don’t fall into the “unschooling” category, but we don’t use a traditional method either. So I made up my own word…

We are “beyond schooling”. Yep, I made it up. You can do things like that when you’re the boss 🙂

What I’m trying to do is take the process of learning something…and throw my idea out the window. I want to go farther. Deeper and even messier. I want to examine my own brain, see what I know to teach and then go outside of my scope. I’m learning with my children all along the way. This doesn’t mean I teach more difficult things…

Beyond School means we learn together in the most fascinating and creative way possible. 

My new Instagram friend @auburnsoul adopted a new idea of homeschooling for her own kids. It’s called “The Awesome Experiment.” She says, “School is going to be awesome 1st and if we have time to fit the boring stuff in after the inspiring knock your socks off stuff…then we’ll do it.” I’m totally in love with that, (partly because I say “awesome” about 50 times a day. )

So whatever type of school you are forming with your children, I encourage you to jump outside your box and make it beyond awesome 🙂 

Amy Schuff - Homeschool Blog

 

 

 

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